São Paulo's health system on brink of collapse as virus runs wild

The health system in Brazil's biggest city is on the brink of collapse, as its mayor says some residents are playing "Russian roulette" with their lives by ignoring social distancing measures and sending the city towards a full-blown lockdown.

On Sunday, the municipal health secretary reported that 91 per cent of São Paulo's intensive care beds were currently filled by Covid-19 patients, and that the entire system would collapse within the next 15 days.

São Paulo's municipal and state governments say they have a full-scale lockdown protocol ready to deploy if the city's social isolation rates do not increase. All non-essential businesses in the city are already closed, but adhesion to isolation measures hovers around 45 to 50 per cent, considerably below the 70 per cent target.

Brazil overtook Spain and Italy to become the country with the fourth-largest number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the world this weekend.

With over 38,000 confirmed cases and 2,832 deaths, the city of São Paulo alone makes up 17.5 per cent of Brazil's entire death toll, and the surrounding state of São Paulo has already recorded more Covid-19 deaths than China.

Speaking in an impromptu press conference on Sunday, São Paulo mayor Bruno Covas said that people ignoring isolation rules were "playing a game of Russian Roulette" with their own lives and that of the entire population.

"Indifference to the death of others is unseemly", he said. "There's no other way out at this time, there is no better vaccine. Before we can think about opening [businesses], we have to stop."

Another proposal put forward by São Paulo's city government is to bring forward a series of public holidays scheduled between now and the end of the year, in an effort to keep people at home.

On a national level, Brazil's coronavirus response continues in tatters, with Health Minister Nelson Teich resigning last week, making him the second man to leave the job in less than a month. His predecessor Luiz Henrique Mandetta was pushed out by far-right President Jair Bolsonaro.

Mr Bolsonaro continues to deny the severity of the virus, dismissing it as "a little flu", despite it having killed 16,118 Brazilians.

Both health ministers disagreed with his approach, refusing to join him in opposing social isolation measures, or advocating for the clinical use of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for Covid-19, which Mr Bolsonaro has touted as a potential cure.